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eyesight reviews

51K views 125 replies 58 participants last post by  aphoid 
#1 ·
I am looking at trading my 2009 forester in on a new 2013 outback. I am new to this forum. I have decided on the 2.5 limited and can not make up my mind on the eyesight feature. I do realize I have to get roof/nav/eyesight which is fine. My question is how well does it work?? Do you think it was worth getting?? I am looking for comments from people who own a 2013 with eyesight. Thanks for any help
 
#2 ·
I love it! I just bought it so keep that in mind.

I drove 7 hrs yesterday and the adaptive cruise control really comes in handy. If you like using cruise on the highway, imagine your next car not offering cruise. That about sums up the difference between adaptive cruise and regular cruise for me. As a convenience feature, it's great. I would pay at least $500 for this feature alone and I'm a cheap SOB. (note that I was driving a 12-yr old Outback exclusively up until a few weeks ago, despite being a station in life that permits otherwise)

Fortunately, I haven't had to use the safety feature much. The lane departure will alert if I stray while trying to reach something in the back seat (in other words, it works as intended). I got my first look at the collision avoidance feature about an hour ago when a pedestrian took her time crossing the street well after the light changed and I idled towards her. It alerted me that an object was in my path but I wasnt close enough for it to engage braking.

One reason I like the Outback is its many safety features. To me, AWD is a safety feature that provides versatility (read: goes where other cars don't) as a bonus. EyeSight, similarly, offers enhanced safety and convenience is the bonus.
 
#3 ·
I've listed some functioning details in the 13 thread if you want to search my posts. Bottom line is I'm impressed with how well they designed this. The way it behaves and doesn't freak out, only makes decisions if its sure...etc really has me liking it. At invoice its only $2400 more than the moonroof which we were going to get anyway. Now that we have it we don't regret it one bit. I didn't need NAV at all but I enjoy the audio interface more and the backup camera. I'll use the NAV for navigating maybe once a year....oh well.
 
#4 ·
Very good for trips

I have had the vehicle for a week or so and have used the feature in lots of situations. I have even had some fun to see how long I could go without touching the pedals, and the secret is to avoid stop signs and not be the first in line at a traffic light.

I give the adaptive cruise very high marks, and the lane departure is fine but I find that it goes off when I know what I am doing, so it will probably encourage me to use my blinker more often. The accident avoidance sometimes signals but I have not tried to test this aspect of the system.

The only weakness is that it doesn't look as far ahead for stopped traffic as a driver, so sometimes approaches stopped traffic at a higher speed than you would, but it does stop in time. Other than this example, the braking and accelerating are very smooth, and it is perfectly mated to the CVT transmission as it helps to slow and speed the car without any shifts.

I think the system is well worth the money.
 
#6 ·
I made the mistake of driving a Limited with this feature at my local dealer (I really think they're getting sick of me at this point). I really liked it... like, a lot.
I told myself I'd never own a car without rain sensing wipers again after owning my 300c for over 5 years, but this is a pretty fair tradeoff ;)
 
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#7 ·
I tested this system extensively before ordering and EyeSight is a system that is well worth the money. The system reacts as fast as it needs to react but in most situations it is smooth and gradual with no sudden inputs (excluding a case where you are going to run into someone).
We ordered the Outback knowing that we have no use for the moon roof or nav because this feature is very compelling for anyone driving a lot. If you are just around town and don't put a lot of miles on a car you might reconsider but for us it was a slam dunk.
As a side note the improved Harmon Karden sound system with nav is superior to what comes stock and the nav will be an added bonus so all in all we liked the EyeSight system and I think it is well implemented by Subaru...
 
#9 ·
A few questions... First, minor issue - it appears the mounted cameras do away with the nifty eyeglass holder. (Minimal issue but I do love that thing...) J

Just came from a dealer who is clearly not up on this feature so the demo was lacking. I did not get a sense of whether or not this is a feature that you turn on or is always on. I did get the impression that it is a set of features (adaptive cruise, lane detection, emergency stopping - have I left something out?).

Again, the dealer was little help though they did try to downplay it - new technology, lots of things to worry about. (Car wash, etc.) Those of you who have this - do you find the care and feeding burdensome? Worth the trouble?

Thanks for any insight. My daughter was in a head on in my 2011 Outback last weekend and walked away with bruises. Thus, I will be buying another one. But I'm trying to get a sense if this package is more hype than help. Given the accident, I'm inclined to go with it. Opinions appreciated!
 
#10 ·
I think it's fantastic. Now that I have it, I don't think I will buy another car without it. Not only for the safety aspect, but just the reduction of stress on the open road and in slow stop and go traffic, makes it worthwhile for me. I especially love how it can judge how hard someone is breaking better than I can. The adaptive cruise control is something you turn on. The other features are on unless you turn them off.

All the naysayers that I've read are from people who don't own it. Most of the complaints seem to be that it doesn't work in all conditions. That's true because the camera's can't react to what it can't see and the car doesn't have sensors to adjust for varying stopping distances due to conditions. But, if you don't own it, it doesn't work in any conditions!
 
#11 ·
Thanks, basketballfan. Can you speak to the care and feeding? No car washes? What other things do you need to be aware of in terms of care of the car to not mess up the Eyesight?

(And, of course, there is the all important question: eyeglass holder or no? :) )

Thanks for your response!
 
#13 ·
Car washes should be okay. However, when cleaning the inside glass you want to spray the cloth you're using, NOT the window.

Also, watch out for new passengers in your car. If ONE MORE PERSON sticks their fingers up in the camera's area, I'm cutting fingers off. Thankfully, the lenses are rescessed, so it is kinda hard to actually touch the lenses.

Eyesight won't work when direct sunlight is shining into the wind shield and if you're in a monsoon, eyesight checks out and go on vacation.

There's a nice cubby right in front of the shifter for your glasses to rest.
 
#12 ·
I have had my OB with Eyesight for just over 2 weeks now and the system is nice in slow and go traffic on the way to work, I have been using it almost every day since I got the car and my only complaint is that it seems to be over aggressive on the brakes and slows the car down more than it needs to most of the time. I tend to set it at the closest following distance that it allows and each time the car ahead of me slows down, the gap between me and that car grows quite a bit which seems to invite people to dive between us causing the car to slow down even more.

With that being said, I am glad I have it and will continue to use it on longer drives, but I will probably use it less in stop and go traffic.
<O:p</O:p
There is no eyeglasses holder but I have never had one in any of my other cars so I do not miss it.
 
#14 ·
Washing the car is not a problem at all. As others said spray your rag not the glass on the inside.

Eyesight is not really meant to be used in stop and go traffic, I've used it to but it was more so just for fun. Eyesight isn't going to see the brake lights a few cars ahead that I see so it can't fully replicate that type of driving smoothness and anticipation. It will however keep me from rear ending someone if I do something stupid.

In regards to it not working in bad conditions its not really a big deal because these are the times you should be on hyper guard anyway. I wish it worked in bright sunlight but then it would need to be radar based which would cost more and would not recognize pedestrians. If you're already in for a limited with moonroof its worth the cost. If I hadn't wanted the moonroof it would be harder to spend $3200-$3600 (invoice cost) for just that feature.
 
#15 ·
OP the Eye Sight system must be turned on each time but the lane departure is on automatically unless you deselect it. I agree that the ES does apply brakes a little too agressively but better than being timid.
This is NOT a new system except for us. In Japan this system has been in operation for 6 years now.
Also as mentioned it is not perfect but as close to useful as I want. Frankly if rain is beating down on my windshield I don't want my autopilot to be fat dumb and happy. This is where judgement comes into play.
So far I have not had it disconnect but then I have not driven in all conditions. Light to moderate rain have no real affect just as it would not for you driving regarding visibility...
 
#17 ·
Lane departure yes but not sure about collision avoidance. I am going to check my manual because I didn't think it was active in other but cruise control.
If it is that would be that much better...
Page 17 does state that you have to actively turn the pre-collision braking off so Tom28 is right the system will stay engaged (except for Active Cruise Control) when driving it. Active Cruise Control does require you to engage it....
 
#19 ·
Eyesight is on when you start the car, yes. Lane departure and collision avoidance are on when the car is started. I know because I've never had to activate it after getting in and it works on the road.
For instance, if a vehicle a little bit ahead of you is turning right and you're coming up on them as they slow, it will sound if I don't take my foot off the gas or hit the brakes. I can see that I don't need to hit the brakes judging by the turn point, their speed, etc. but the car is still seeing them as an object in my path. Pretty cool especially if you're not paying attention. But I'm sure none of us text and drive, right? ;)
 
#22 ·
Going to agree with pretty much everything that has already been said. I've had it for about a month (~1200 miles) and think it's worth the cost since I was in the market for a Limited with moon roof anyway. The nav was definitely not on my wishlist, but I have enjoyed using it a lot, especially when it was automatically taking into account current traffic.

I put my sunglasses in the tray in front of the shifter now (with my phone) instead of up in the overhead stash which my previous car had. It was a slight bother at first but now I really don't mind, especially since I don't want to be storing all kinds of crap in that little cubby to the point where it's unusable anyway - so it just holds my phone & sunglasses. The passenger's sunglasses go in the console storage if they want them.

But enough about sunglasses storage!

I love EyeSight, mainly the safety aspect. Knowing that it will brake optimally for me to avoid a rear-end collision is really great, since I've had a few close calls before due to distractions. When I hop in my wife's car I get nervous every time I'm slowing down in traffic because I know it's up to me to stop the car in time! I leave all the safety features on, the collision warning pops up occasionally, for example when a car pulls across in front without much room or when I'm hurtling towards some freeway barrels on a forked road. It's never triggered emergency braking though, it easily detects that the object is moving out of the way or that I'm steering around the barrels and won't collide.

I like that the cameras are mounted in the cabin instead of on the bumper to minimize damage to the system. I got the hard/foldy sunshade from my dealer, while it doesn't fit as snugly as it would without EyeSight, it still works and is a long way (~3 inches) from actually touching the lens thanks to the deep recessing of the lenses.

I've used the adaptive cruise control around town & on the freeway. The manual suggests that it should only be used on limited-access roads (freeways) and I'm inclined to agree, since it doesn't see as far ahead as I usually can in traffic (ie. brake lights from the 2nd & 3rd vehicles ahead). I also had a scare using it around town while approaching traffic stopped at a light. It seemed to ignore the stopped vehicle ahead until it was within the ~2 second following distance and after the Outback eventually started braking on its own I hit the brakes pretty hard to stop in time -- I think the collision avoidance might have kicked in that time as I had a flashback of the fact that it can't guarantee collision avoidance if the speed difference is less than about 19 mph. Doing 45 mph with adaptive cruise control behind a stopped vehicle is a BAD IDEA - it's still cruise control. For the highway though it's marvelous. Combined with the lane departure warning it makes freeway driving a lot less mentally taxing.

I also agree that sometimes it brakes a bit harder than I would when first seeing traffic slowdown. It's probably just a result of me being able to see the traffic ahead, and it hasn't been uncomfortable. If you're following a vehicle at some distance and somebody pulls in front of you while accelerating away from you, EyeSight won't freak out and slam on the brakes just because they're within the following distance - it recognizes that they'll soon be outside the following distance and continues at your existing speed until the gap widens back to your desired setting.

Since I also got the Nav as a result of EyeSight a few comments on it: You can tell the nav what your MPG estimates are for city & highway driving and they will be taken into account for route planning. I usually use the "green" navigation method which chooses the lowest fuel consuming option of various quick alternatives. The nav UI is pretty good and voice navigation is convenient, if a little slow (mainly when it loads the list of cities). The on-screen displays for lane selection & exit lanes are really good so you can get in the correct lane well in advance, if that information is available. The turn-by-turn voice prompts don't give you much time to prepare, so you need to keep an eye on the "next turn" indicator and maybe have a rough idea of the overall route (which is easy with the "overview" option -- add it to the quick menu!). The 3D map display is great though, you can see a long way down the illustrated road to see what's coming up. I haven't used any other in-car navs before, only Android phone Navigation, and the Outback's navigation is overall as good as Android phone nav.

Collision avoidance systems result in about a 20% decrease in collision claims and 50% decrease in bodily injury liability. If the insurance company passes on those savings to you (and I expect they do), the EyeSight will pay for itself over the life of the vehicle.

tl;dr: Recommended.
 
#25 ·
Great post Hadouken. Just a couple of more points. I do stay alert when using Eyesight. So, I will occasionally adjust the adaptive cruise control speed lower before the system kicks in. I try to anticipate the speed of the general flow of traffic.

I also read in the manual that you should cover the eyesight with cellophane and rubber bands to keep the window spray used in car washes from hitting the lens. It is a good idea but I had several car washes and haven't done it yet. I think it is just as good just to tell the attendant to spray the rag instead of the glass.

I know there are a lot of accessories to deal with the sunglass situation.

I love Eyesight.
 
#28 ·
Great post Hadouken. Just a couple of more points. I do stay alert when using Eyesight. So, I will occasionally adjust the adaptive cruise control speed lower before the system kicks in. I try to anticipate the speed of the general flow of traffic.

I also read in the manual that you should cover the eyesight with cellophane and rubber bands to keep the window spray used in car washes from hitting the lens. It is a good idea but I had several car washes and haven't done it yet. I think it is just as good just to tell the attendant to spray the rag instead of the glass.

I know there are a lot of accessories to deal with the sunglass situation.

I love Eyesight.
 
#30 ·
I would love to find a way to have the video from the eyesight displayed with it's detections shown on the nav screen, like the video in the promo videos.
 
#31 ·
Friday's a month of my 2013 doing pretty much all of my tasks but winter driving and I'm glad I have the system.

I can't stress enough how anybody approaching the price of the Limited should test EyeSight. First just for the convenience. In our case we had a family member killed in an auto accident a year ago where all evidence shows some help on defense might have saved him. Next comes offense - we could all mess up. Having had all with that tragedy from ID and getting the body home to knowing we could all mess up and cause an accident that could kill somebody else's love one I say EyeSight is a bargain everybody should have.

Basically the experience of family member killed in an accident even though it was not their fault makes you want anything possible including your own behavior to not let it occur again whether or not it's your fault. Thus, I say you want EyeSight for the daily convenience and as one more tool to help to avoid the terrible experience we had.

On a simple level I was rear ended in August by somebody in a brand new car. I know EyeSight would have never allowed that to happen - clear day, traveling north, me at stop light, the other person did a basic mess up.
 
#32 ·
On a simple level I was rear ended in August by somebody in a brand new car. I know EyeSight would have never allowed that to happen - clear day, traveling north, me at stop light, the other person did a basic mess up.
Sorry for the loss of your family member. With that said, I don't think i'd put my whole basket of lug nuts in the Eyesight basket on thinking it can prevent every kind of collision.

The only way to do that is to not drive.
 
#35 ·
We no way fool ourselves thinking the EyeSight system is a savior or the answer but we all have different values. In my case I chose it luxury, and as insurance before that which was offered for my new cel phone.

Forgetting about the family tragedy, I could have messed up just like the guy who rear ended me this summer, and I've spent enough time in the car to know it would have worked if there were my mess up.

I had a very long day that combined a lot of work and a few hundred miles of driving. It was good when it gave me a reminder that I was getting tired. I've also had it put on the brakes just as I was doing so when a jerk cut in front of me. Maybe I'd have been slower to do that on a long day.

Every day you drive the car with EyeSight you have a nice luxury in adaptive cruise control. Every day you drive the car you might also have a scenario where it could help avoid a problem. My values are I'll take the luxury of adaptive cruise control over say eating out which I can't stand and probably costs more. If it helps avoid an accident I'll take it. YMMV.
 
#36 · (Edited)
I recently purchased a 2013 2.5 Limited CVT with the works (Including the Eyesight Moonroof Package). The best car purchase I have ever done. It was my first Subaru and I started researching the Forrester in 2011 and then quickly moved to the Outback for more of the creature comforts it offered. I considered buying in 2012 but when I read about Eyesight coming to the 2013 Outback it was a no brainer. VERY few manufacturers offer this complete driver assistance system and on cars that a much more expensive than Subaru.

A consumer magazine did a brief report on Eyesight even before completing their full review of the new 2013 Outback.

<O:pWhen I went to the dealer to test drive a 2013 the sales guys had proudly parked a 2013 with the special appearance package in front ready for me to drive. I pointed to a 2013 with Eyesight they had on the lot and said "I want to drive that one". I wasn't disappointed. He wasn't that familiar with EyeSight (which unfortunately seems to be the norm for most dealers right now). I knew as much as he did - but I had done my homework.

<O:pBut to how now it how works,<O:p
Once you get over any intimidation you may have with a system that has that much control of the driving experience you realize is only is there to ASSIST and cannot take control of the braking and throttle except where really needed. The system is always on and has button to disable lane departure warnings and collision control. (These features are automatically enabled when the car is started again).

<O:pIs it hype? In today’s world of distracted driving (I have to admit I can be one at times too) this is an essential tool to eliminated or at least mitigate the effects of an accident. I saw that another respondent said they wouldn't own a car without it and I must agree. I must applaud Subaru for introducing this to the US market. I'm sure other manufactures will introduce something similar in response eventually. I equate this to the introduction of safety features like airbags, headrests even seatbelts. The self-drive car is coming but it is years away from adoption. This is a technological advance that is here today that still allows drivers to maintain control but provide assistance that is essential in the more dangerous driving world today. If you research the press on this system you find worldwide press. It’s been in Japan for some time now and from what I read it seems the vast majority Subarus sold in Japan are equipped with it.

<O:pDo yourself a favor if you are truly interested and watch some of the videos on Eyesight on the web. They are very good in explaining what it does and how it works in driver's terms. <O:p
 
#37 ·
Wow - thanks for all the replies, folks. You've given me much to think about. I was thinking of not going for it. The truth is, I do not do the kind of highway driving that is suited to cruise control (though if I did, I would certainly want the adaptive cruise - long overdue improvement). The rest of the features, while nice, seem to be auxiliary to being an attentive driver. I did find more info on the Subaru site about ES (it took some real searching...) that filled in a lot of information. No, the dealers are not up on this one.

imwjl - so sorry for your loss. I am very sensitized, as I explained, my daughter was in a head on with my 2011 OB last Saturday. Looking at pictures of the car and knowing that she walked away with a few bruises... I think we all are making a wise choice with Subaru in terms of safety, with or without ES.

Again, thanks all for all the info.
 
#38 ·
What does Eyesight do if you're heading through an intersection and someone blows through a stop light, perpendicular to you, but with enough space to get through? Is it smart enough to know your speed, calculate the other guy's speed, and figure out that you're safe?





And can it lean on the horn and throw up a digital middle finger at the guy?
 
#39 ·
What does Eyesight do if you're heading through an intersection and someone blows through a stop light, perpendicular to you, but with enough space to get through? Is it smart enough to know your speed, calculate the other guy's speed, and figure out that you're safe?





And can it lean on the horn and throw up a digital middle finger at the guy?
Yes it is smart enough for this situation. Worst case scenario its just going to beep at you but no brakes. Honestly though it probably won't do a dang thing as it needs 1-2.5 seconds to fully recognize an object and calculate closing speed.
 
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